


Feeling Blue

by CrazyJ



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: 2017, All The Bad Ideas, Bad Ideas, Binge Drinking, Drunken Confessions, Enemies to Friends, In The Name Of Your Country, M/M, Outdoor Game, Patriotism, Stadium Series, Superstitions, Sushi, Team Canada, backyard party, drunken escapades, master plans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-22
Updated: 2016-06-22
Packaged: 2018-07-16 14:13:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7271551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrazyJ/pseuds/CrazyJ
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sid’s favourite colour is red because he is a Canadian and he loves his country.</p><p>Sid’s least favourite colour is blue because every time the Pens wear the blue throwback jerseys, Sid winds up with a concussion.</p><p>So you can imagine Sid’s reaction when he finds out the Pittsburgh Penguins will be wearing their blue jerseys for the 2017 Stadium Series. Joy.</p><p>  <b>OR</b></p><p>  <i>The story where Tyler Seguin, Jonathan Toews and Claude Giroux do <b>whatever</b> it takes to keep Sid from getting another concussion.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Feeling Blue

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea where this monster came from. Mention of copious amounts of alcohol and drunken confessions. Minor mention of someone being tied up briefly. All the feels.

Sid couldn’t totally remember whose idea it had been to have a Team Canada get together, but he did seriously question how the entire 2016 World Cup of Hockey roster had ended up spread across his main floor and backyard as if it were the most normal thing in the world.

Stepping around Stamkos and Giroux who were arguing about who knows what, Sid maneuvered himself through his kitchen to where he knew he had stored more beer to add to the cooler in the back, somehow already running low even though it was only nine o’clock in the evening. Flashing a smile at the two as he passed, Sid shook his head at the thought that his most hated rival and enemy in the form of Claude Giroux was currently leaning against his fridge in his house in Pittsburgh where he lived. Amazing what a few good passes and a couple of gold medals on the international stage could do for a friendship.

Hoisting a few boxes over his shoulder, Sid walked outside where he found the large majority of the party’s inhabitants drinking around the heated pool, with a few of the younger guys swimming around happily if the look of contentment on their faces was anything to go by. 

“Oh captain, my captain!” Tyler cheered from the pool when he noticed him coming out, holding up the empty beer in his hand and tipping it in Sid’s general direction. “Have I ever told you I appreciate you?”

“Tyler, what did I tell you about calling me captain outside of the rink?” Sid chided, rolling his eyes at the younger man’s giggles and moving to start shifting the beers around in the cooler so the warm ones were on the bottom and the cold ones were on the top.

“Not to do it, but your reaction is hilarious every time which makes it totally worth it.”

“Weren’t you the one to point out to me that our team was made up of eight NHL captains?”

“Yes, but that makes you the captain of the captains!” Tyler retorted gleefully, pulling his lithe body out of the water and walking over to snatch a beer from the top of the ice. “It’s great.”

“Don’t let Tows hear you say that, he might have an aneurism,” Keith said casually from where he was lounging near the grill. “We all know it kills him inside to wear an A on his chest in those tournaments.”

“Imagine how he’s going to feel at the Olympics,” Jamie said with a soft laugh. “Guaranteed Sid is going to be captain again and Webs and Tazer will be alternates like Sochi. Probably going to be a similar group of guys to last time actually.”

“Except I’m going to be there,” Tyler said petulantly, if not still a little bitter at being held off the roster last time for some of the “older guys to get their last chance at an Olympic medal.” Whatever.

“And me,” Giroux added without thought as he, Stamkos, Toews and the three goalies exited the house, making their way across the deck to where everyone else was sitting.

“Barring injuries, I imagine the Olympic roster will look pretty much exactly like this,” Sid said after finishing emptying the second box of beer and looking at the guys around him. “We had a good team, no reason we won’t be able to replicate that again in Korea.”

“Except I’ll be there,” Tyler added woefully.

“And me,” Giroux added with a grin. “Don’t you think, Sid?”

“Do you want the honest answer?” Sid retorted.

“Come on Sid; admit that you and I play pretty well together, we’ll be great in Korea!”

“I’d rather chew my own arm off,” Sid said drily, looking at Claude with utter contempt much to the amusement of everyone around them. Old habits die hard.

“I don’t mind this then, no? It gives me a better chance to make the team if the holy child of our country cannot play because he only has one arm.”

“As long as you know the only way you are good enough to make the team is if I only have one arm then I can die happy,” Sid replied with more bite than he had intended.

“Oh pumpkin, we both know that’s not true,” Claude bit back, smiling unnervingly in Sid’s direction. 

“Stop calling me pumpkin you pompous orange freak,” Sid responded angrily, his hackles rising as everyone around them burst into laughter at his response, still not understanding why Claude had taken to calling Sid “pumpkin” around the locker room during World’s a few months back, just knowing that it drove him absolutely crazy. And if anyone did ask, it had nothing to do with the time Claude and Sid got drunk and Sid affectionately named Claude pumpkin at two in the morning when everyone else was asleep in the rooms around them, much to Claude’s amusement. _Stupid alcohol. Stupid drunken nicknames. Stupid Flyers._

“Awwe, Cindy, you seem to be in a rather bad mood this fine evening. This has nothing to do with the game tomorrow against us does it?”

“Call me Cindy one more time and I will ride you so hard into the boards your ancestors will feel it,” Sid hissed, ignoring the look of surprise on everyone’s face as he said it.

“That’s mildly aggressive,” Weber said off handedly, causing a few snickers around the group.

“Oh but Giroux is right,” Tanger said from out of nowhere and Sid looked around until he found him leaning against the lip of the pool beside Marchand and Tavares, the water up to his chest.

“He is not,” Sid said with a grimace, avoiding the look from Toews who was staring at him rather knowingly.

“He is and you know it,” Tanger said with a wry grin and everyone turned their attention to him as he continued to speak. “You see tomorrow the Pens and the Flyers play in the Stadium Series at Heinz Field in our throwback jerseys.”

“We’re aware,” Price said snidely, “if the fact we will be there is any indication.”

“Yes, yes, but are you aware that every time we wear our blue throwback jersey’s Sid has wound up with a concussion and he has spent the last six weeks since he found out about it trying to convince everyone in management that it be best if he doesn’t play?”

“Traitor,” Sid muttered under his breath just as everyone around him erupted into various reactions.

“You’ve got to be kidding me?”

“You can’t be serious!”

“Fuck, really?”

“Sid, why?”

“You can’t actually think you are going to get another concussion, can you?” Jamie asked and that was what had the group going silent as they all stared at Sidney in surprise and shock, his stony appearance doing nothing to show the utter panic he was experiencing internally.

“How did you know?” Sid asked Tanger eventually, making eye contact so it was obvious he was directing the question at him and ignoring Jamie’s. 

“Ten years of friendship, unfortunately,” Tanger said with a quirk of his lip. “I know you. You’re not exactly the most subtle guy in the world; you’ve been acting erratically for weeks. If anyone even so much as mentions the words “head” and “injury” and/or “concussion” you tense up and go silent. It’s not exactly rocket science, mon amie.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

“You are not the only one with superstitions,” Tanger said cryptically.

“Sid, what are the chances that you get a concussion again while wearing the same jersey you got a concussion in the first time? The chances are absolutely miniscule,” Jamie said after only a slight pause, looking at him with the same expression as almost everyone else around them.

“Tell that to the 13 months I lost,” Sid said bitterly, crossing his arms across his chest and feeling incredibly small surrounded by 22 of the best players in the NHL, seven of which as noted were captains just like him. “I know it’s stupid, trust me, I know. But what if it does happen? I don’t have anything if I don’t have hockey…”

“Is it really just the blue jerseys though?” Weber asked cautiously, though he was nodding along as if he understood now, along with a few of the other guys. “Aren’t you scared to play every time you go on the ice? You could get a concussion at any time, it’s not like it’s just because you are wearing blue.”

“I know I don’t talk about this much, but the doctor said the concussion was caused by the force, velocity and location of the impact. The concussion was already there and getting worse when I got hit the second time, all it did was force the longevity of the concussion to triple.”

“Meaning?” Weber pressed.

“That the hit I took in the blue jersey is what cost me the better part of two seasons, not the hit I took in my black jersey. I’m not sure I’m willing to risk my career over a stupid outdoor game in a blue jersey, but I’m also not sure I’m willing to admit to the world that’s what I’m trying to do either.”

A strange silence settled over the group as they all considered the weight of Sid’s words. On the one hand, what Sid was saying was ludicrous and the chances of him getting hit again were practically zero to none, but on the other hand, they were hockey players who taped their sticks in a certain direction and ate certain meals at specific time of day to keep their routines alive, so really who were they to judge?

“It’s not that crazy,” a voice said quietly and Sid found himself looking over at Claude who was eyeing him warily.

“It’s not?” Jamie asked.

“Have you ever had a concussion Benners?”

“Um, I had one when I was like 15?”

“But a grade one concussion right?”

“I don’t actually know if they graded it to be honest with you,” Jamie replied uneasily.

“Look, as someone who has had a couple of concussions I can tell you for a fact that they are the scariest thing in the world. Not knowing why you are feeling the way you are feeling, not knowing when it’s going to get better, starting to feel better and then waking up and suddenly feeling like you were on that first day, lost and confused. There are no timelines for concussions and as a professional athlete that’s the worst thing in the world. I’ve had four now and as much as I am a grown ass man, I can tell you for a fact that I have never been more scared than when the doctors told me I had another concussion and that’s taking into consideration that mine were only grade one or two concussions. Sid had a grade three concussion that knocked him out for an entire year.”

A stunned silence took over the group once more as everyone tried to digest Claude’s words. As Sid looked around the group he made eye contact with all the other players who had ever had a concussion to find them nodding in agreement at him, their heads bowing in apparent support.

“Okay,” Price started after a moment and Sid was a bit surprised to hear the goalie speaking up since he was never really sure where the two of them stood with each other. “So let’s just say that we all agree here that it’s not worth pissing off the hockey gods and risking Sid’s head, do I have to point out to you that the game starts in 12 hours?”

“What exactly did you say to management anyways?” Tavares piped up from the water and Sid winced at how poorly that conversation had gone when he had approached Mario.

“The first time I tried I told him that it would be better for me to rest up so we could prepare to make a push for the playoffs,” Sid said morosely.

“And the second time?” someone asked.

“Well, I also tried telling him I could catch a cold, injure myself on the less than stellar ice conditions, get blinded by the sun or die.”

“How did that go?” Weber asked with amusement and the group laughed quietly at the look of concern that crossed Sid’s face.

“Let’s just say it was along the lines of bag skates every practice for the rest of the season, lessened ice time and the lecture of a lifetime if I even considered not leading my team in the Stadium Series which is a time honoured tradition,” Sid parroted instantly, deepening his voice to mimic Mario’s. “Even after I told him the real reason at which point he laughed in my face, patted me on the shoulder and told me I couldn’t possibly be that unlucky.

“So we’re screwed,” Jamie said matter-of-factly as the rest of the group looked around at each other warily.

“Not necessarily,” a deep voice said and Sid raised an eyebrow and turned to look at Jonny who was standing a few feet behind him against the deck rails.

“Mario has already threatened him if he’s not there and Sid’s told him the real reason he doesn’t want to play, what exactly are we supposed to do?” Keith asked Jonny.

“Come up with a reason good enough.”

“What exactly do you suggest? It’s not like he is going to be able to pretend like he is sick, Mario would see right through him,” Shea said, just as Jamie started speaking as well.

“He’d never be able to fake an injury, the medical teams we have are too good, they’d know he was lying and it wouldn’t be worth it to have to fake something severe long term just to get out of one game.”

“We could pretend someone had passed away?” Duchene suggested and Sid would never admit in a millions years that the use of the word “we” from everyone was doing something funny to his heart. “You have the most private life ever, couldn’t we come up with a fake cousin or aunt or something back in Nova Scotia?”

“You do realize I lived with Mario for five years right?” Sid said with a sigh, rubbing his temple with a groan. “He’s like a second dad to me and he has my parents’ number, all he would have to do would be to call and ask and they’d fold instantly. I’m pretty sure they like him more than they like me.”

“I can see why,” Giroux muttered under his breath, but there was no heat to it and the silence that settled over the group once more was contemplative instead of stilted afterwards.

“What about food poisoning?” Marchand said after a minute and hey, that actually wasn’t a half bad idea. “That’s sort of believable right?”

“We could cook you a blue burger,” Burns said with a grin, causing Sid to gulp audibly as he looked at the man he had helped knock out of the playoffs last year. “That’d have you hurling in minutes.”

“I don’t think the point is to actually give him food poisoning,” Getzlaf said from his lounge chair. “I think the point is to _pretend_ we’ve given him food poisoning.”

“How exactly do we ‘pretend’ to give him food poisoning?” Price said, with emphasis on the word pretend.

“That’s easy,” Tyler said with a laugh and everyone turned back to the water where he had gone after his initial comment and was now floating in the water. “Alcohol and pictures of gross food.”

“Why does that give him food poisoning?” Jamie asked his best friend, looking at him with a fondness that suggested something to Sid he wasn’t sure he wanted to know about.

“It doesn’t, but what it does give him is a lot of the same symptoms of it,” Jonny said, nodding along as he continued speaking, holding his fingers up to count things off as he carried on Tyler’s thought process. “Nausea? Check. Queasiness? Check. The sweats? Check. Headache from dehydration? Check. All we have to do is put enough alcohol into him to get him feeling feverish and then show him pictures of a food he hates. Psychological warfare. When he wakes up in the morning we all make sure to show him that same picture so when he gets to the rink, Kris just has to tell management about the food he ate that supposedly made him sick and Sid just has to hurl or pretend to hurl at that moment.”

“There’s only one problem,” Tyler spoke up again just as everyone started to speak, looking up at everyone standing around him. “Mario is never going to believe him if Sid comes in throwing up conveniently the same day of a game he’s spent weeks trying to get out of. He’ll know something is up.”

“So what do you suggest?’ Sid asked.

“Well, that’s also easy. You don’t do it alone.”

“What do you mean?”

“If you walk into the changing room throwing up, no one is going to believe you because they know you were trying to get out of it and just went to extreme measures. But if a few people walk in throwing up and looking queasy it would be nearly impossible to believe that it had been just to get out of the game because you aren’t the only one who is sick. That way it just looks like really bad timing and not a ploy to avoid the blue jersey.”

“Damn,” Weber whistled after a few seconds of contemplation. “That’s actually pretty fucking brilliant squirt. But how the fuck do we decide who gets blindingly trashed tonight to help keep Sid out of the game tomorrow and who would actually be willing to do that.”

“Well since this was Tyler’s idea, I vote he be one of the people,” Tavares said with a raised brow, looking around to see if anyone would object.

“That’s fine,” Tyler replied easily. “I honestly haven’t gotten drunk in forever and at least if I am here with you guys then I know I will be safe. Hell knows I got into enough shit with the Bruins for it.”

The group nodded amiably at that and Sid shot a quick look at Marchand who at least had the decency to look guilty, looking down into the water with a look that told Sid he probably needed to ask him what had happened there, just not right now when his entire Canadian team had for some reason decided to help him get out of a game.

“By that logic, Tazer should be another one of the guys,” Price suggested and the look that Jonny shot him told Sid everything he needed to know about the apparent feud that had started between the two of them after the Habs/Blackhawks game back in November.

“That’s actually not a half bad idea,” Jamie noted, looking once more around the group. “Tyler is one thing, but if Captain Serious gets sick as well? No one in their right mind would believe that Tazer wasn’t telling the truth, not if it’s Sid and Jonny together.”

“I’m not Captain Serious,” Toews muttered darkly, looking at the other captains to see them all nodding along and knowing they were right. “Do I get a say in this?”

“Well yeah, but it would be rather unpatriotic of you not to help your country,” Claude said with a gleam and if he hadn’t caught himself, Sid probably would have smiled at that.

“I don’t see you offering,” Jonny retorted and if it was possible, Claude somehow grinned bigger at the implications.

“I can’t, it wouldn’t make sense. Captains of rivalry teams both being knocked out of the Stadium Series because of food poisoning from a Team Canada party? The world would implode at the thought. Trust me, if this were any other scenario I’d probably be the first one jumping in on it since I know how much fun Sid gets when he actually allows himself to get drunk, but this time I’m going to have to pass.”

“You just don’t want to play against me,” Sid muttered, though the look Claude had sent him just before he spoke up had screamed nothing but sincerity and had Sid thinking back to what had happened behind closed doors at World’s.

“That’s bullshit and you know it Sidney. I’d rather have you out on the ice and beat your team because we were legitimately better than you than need to feel good about winning because you weren’t. I _like_ playing against you, you big oaf; proves that I am actually a pretty decent hockey player.”

“You’re a great hockey player” Sid said before he could even think about it, wincing visibly as he waited for the barrage of insults he was about to get from Claude, opening his eyes after a moment to see the man watching him with an expressionless face.

“Oh man, did you just compliment Giroux while you were sober?” Burns interrupted the silence with a large toothless grin, cackling at the very thought of it. “Oh man, I can’t wait to see what drunken Crosby is going to be like after this.”

“Hey man, I’m in,” Doughty said with a laugh and a fist bump with Burns. “Look, I won’t get as drunk as you guys need to get, but I haven’t let loose in a while either, it probably wouldn’t hurt to have another player who is feeling a bit queasy.

“Me too,” Holtby added in, his voice dark and gruff though Sid knew from World’s that he was actually incredibly witty when he wanted to be and incredibly silent the other 95 per cent of the time.

“Yeah, me three,” said Bergeron. “But I gotta go home after the game, so make sure to stop me from going too crazy.”

“So what,” Sid started to say, speaking over a blockage in his throat and needing to clear it to continue though he made sure to keep his voice as skeptical as he was feeling. “Segsy, Tazer and I get drunk out of our minds and a few more of you get drunk enough to be hungover and then we tell everyone we had bad sushi?”

“How can you not like sushi, you are from the coast?” Jamie said instantly with an aghast expression on his face. “Sushi is delicious.”

“Sushi is unhygienic. I like my fish cooked, not still flopping in my mouth, thank you very much.”

“Why on earth would you be eating sushi at 11 pm at night?” Carey asked with the same hint of annoyance as earlier. “And doesn’t Mario live across the street, wouldn’t he know whether you left or not?”

“We could say he lost a bet?” Tyler suggested. “Post a picture on Twitter or Instagram or something of a bunch of us with some sushi. Go get some from the store and stock up on alcohol that’s actually going to get us drunk at the same time, no offense to Molson’s or anything. Caption the post with something about how Sid is being forced to eat sushi under duress, bring it back here so Mario doesn’t get suspicious and then start drinking?”

“You know, Ty,” Weber started, looking at the younger man in a new light. “You might not act like the brightest bulb in the box, but that’s a pretty damn good idea.”

“I feel like I should be offended,” Tyler said with a pout, causing everyone to start laughing at his expense.

“You probably should be, babe,” said Jamie and well, wasn’t that little endearment interesting.

“Am I the only one who thinks this is a God awful idea?” Sid asked with a hint of fear creeping into his tone, looking around the group and praying someone would come up with a better idea. Maybe getting hit in the head wouldn’t be so bad after all. 

“It’s that or put on the blue jersey,” Tanger said slyly and the look on his face told him that his friend knew exactly which option he would pick.

“Fuck.”

“Okay, so me, Doughty, Burns, Holts and Weber will go in one car and get some more alcohol and Sid, Segs, Jamie and Tazer will go get sushi and snacks in another since I am starving,” Claude delegated without complaint from anyone else. “We meet back here in an hour, take the shot of the sushi and a group shot for good measure and then start loading everyone who volunteered with alcohol while the rest of us sit back and watch with our singular beverage of choice.”

“This idea still sounds awful,” Sid muttered, though he knew he was going to go through with it regardless. “Also, where on earth are we going to get sushi at this time of night?”

“There’s a 24-hour supermarket like ten blocks from here, Sidney, don’t even start,” Tanger said pointedly. “We are doing this for you princesse. I shouldn’t even be helping you; we could use you on the ice tomorrow.”

“Why **are** you helping me?” Sid asked carefully.

“Because you are more use to me with your head on right then you are in a hospital bed. That and I would hate myself if you got hurt because I didn’t support you and your stupid superstitions.”

“They aren’t stupid,” Sid said under his breath, pulling his cap off and running his fingers briefly through his hair. “Has no one considered the fact that Sidney Crosby, Jamie Benn, Tyler Seguin and Jonathan Toews together in one place is likely going to make the world explode, especially if we are seen together by a fan? Same for the other group.”

“Its 10:49 on a Friday night, Sid, everyone will be home with their families. I just checked the supermarket’s website, it is actually still open 24-hours, so you better get going if you want to make it back in time,” Tanger said over Sid’s protests. “Now shut up and go, we literally have twelve hours until the game, we are all up past our bedtimes anyways.”

“I’m going to die,” Sid said morosely, heading inside and hearing as several other bodies shuffled along behind him, a bunch of hoots and hollers to be heard from the guys staying behind as everyone got ready and headed to the cars.

“You’re going to be okay,” a soft voice said from behind Sid as he pulled on his shoes and he didn’t need to turn to know that it was Claude who was speaking.

“I don’t understand why everyone is helping me,” Sid replied softly back, turning his head just slightly so he could make eye contact with the younger man. “Something is bound to go wrong here.”

“I won’t let anyone hurt you,” Claude responded and the sincerity in his voice once more felt like a punch to the gut as Sid thought back to the gentleness he now knew the other man possessed.

“You’re the reason I’m here in the first place,” Sid whispered, feeling guilty for saying the words out loud, continuing at the confused look on Claude’s face. “If anyone is going to give me another concussion it’s going to be a Flyer. I know you guys hate me as much as I hate most of you. You guys play dirty and I always walk away black and blue. I can’t risk getting hurt tomorrow, especially not against a group of guys who actually wants to hurt me.”

“Yeah,” Claude said after a moment, his voice full of an unplaced emotion as he reluctantly agreed. “No one will hurt you tonight though. I’ll take everyone’s phones away when you start to get drunk, make sure no one tries to snap anything incriminating.”

“Why are you helping me?” Sid whispered back, noticing for the first time how close they were and wondering distantly where everyone else had gone and if they were waiting in the cars for them.

“You know why,” Claude said quietly, so quietly that if Sid hadn’t been standing mere inches away from him he wasn’t sure he would have heard, watching as Claude stepped back, breaking the spell and turning to walk outside the house just as a horn beeped from the drive.

Turning to start heading towards the door himself, Sid saw a motion out of the corner of his eye and looked over to see Carey eyeing him with a thoughtful expression as Sid stopped in his place in horror. 

“Be careful, Sid,” was all Price said, before he too turned and headed outside the house, only in the opposite direction of the horn that was beeping incessantly in the drive.

“Tyler, get out of the driver’s seat,” was all Sid said with a sigh a moment later when he opened up his driver’s door, Tyler having finally stopped honking the horn. “Also, where did you get my keys from?”

“That’s not important,” Tyler said off handedly as he hopped out of the front and slid into the seat in the back beside Jamie.

“What **is** the likelihood we get noticed together?” Jonny asked looking over at Sid from where he was sitting shot gun as Sid waited for the car behind them to start backing up, shifting the car into reverse as they did.

“I have no idea,” Sid replied honestly, turning right at the end of the block, his breath catching when music suddenly started blaring out of the speakers around him, scaring him half to death.

“Goddamnit Tyler, do we need to have a talk about not touching my stuff?” Sid said with a huff of annoyance, looking in the rearview mirror to see Tyler grinning ruefully as he flipped through his phone and chose a more appropriate song from the dubstep that had been playing. “How did you even hook up your phone that fast?”

“Talking to him won’t work,” Jamie and Tazer said in unison and Sid resigned himself to the awful music he was sure they were going to play for the rest of the drive.

Despite himself, a few blocks later Sid found himself nodding along to the Eminem song that was playing, muttering a few of the words under his breath , having learned them after some of the guys on his team had called him “uncultured” and “undignified” for not owning a single Eminem CD. Glancing over at the right mirror to check where he was in the lines, Sid saw Jonny looking at him with an amused expression.

“I wouldn’t have taken you for an Eminem man,” Jonny said with a laugh, though his shoulders were still tense and Sid wondered absentmindedly who needed to get drunk tonight more: him or Jonny.

“Yeah, I figured you were into classical shit like Mozart,” Jamie said from the back, leaning forward so he could join in on the conversation though no one had asked him too.

“No, no, he’s totally into like old musicals and shit like Annie,” Tyler said cheekily, hooking his arms around the back of Sid’s headrest despite the fact his head had been using it only moments ago.

“Someone remind me again how I ended up with all you lot in my house concocting stupid plans that are going to get me killed?” Sid asked to no one in particular to change the topic.

“We are raising awareness for the Olympics and for hockey funds in Canada since they are declining,” Jonny said without pause. “It’s good publicity to have all of Team Canada looking chummy with each other in the middle of the season to show that patriotism has no boundaries.”

“Was that in the script?” 

“Shut up,” Jonny responded to Sid, his cheeks colouring a light tinge of pink and the corner of Sid’s lips quirked up as he turned his attention back to the road so he could pull into the mostly deserted parking lot, parking in a patch of darkness along the building’s edge.

“Alright, Segs and Benny, why don’t you go stock up on snacks, Tazer and I can go get the sushi and we will meet up in the middle in 15 minutes,” Sid delegated to the agreement of everyone in the car. “Oh and try and not get recognized, I don’t need PR on my ass for causing an incident at a supermarket.”

“Would I do anything like that?” Tyler said cheekily, hopping out of the car at the same time as Jamie and skipping, literally skipping through the supermarket doors as Tazer and Sid watched from the car.

“I get it, you know,” Jonny said just as Sid turned the car off and he found himself looking over at the other man with a careful expression. “I get why you don’t want to play tomorrow. I know a lot the guys are just going along with it for the sake of it, but I don’t want to see you get hurt. From one captain to another, you have my support.”

“Thank you,” Sid said softly, reaching out and patting his friend on the shoulder with a small smile before turning and exiting the car, pulling his brim down low over his hair and regretting the fact that both he and Tazer were wearing Team Canada clothing like pretty much everyone else at the party.

“We’re going to make it about four feet,” Sid said out loud, resigning himself to his fate and entering the supermarket, heading left to where he knew they would likely find the sushi. As Jonny fell into step beside him, Sid looked around and noticed only a few other people in the store, one of which looked homeless and drunk and was taking up a significant amount of attention from the employees which Sid felt mildly guilty for being happy about. As they reached the case where the sushi was held, Sid’s stomach rolled at the thought of eating raw fish and was glad that they only had to pretend to be eating it, noting the expression on Jonny’s face that said the same.

“How much do you think we need to buy for it to be believable?” Jonny asked and Sid looked at the rows of sushi boxes in front of them with uncertainty.

“There are only six or seven of us pretending to eat it, so maybe like 3 boxes so we each have two or three, that wouldn’t be too far off base would it?”

“No, probably not, especially if we are having a party, no one would actually think we were just eating sushi, let’s just grab three and go.”

“There are like eight different kinds here, what exactly are we supposed to choose?” Sid said with a hint of panic in his voice, looking over the different options and zeroing in on one that he at least recognized. “California rolls are popular aren’t they?”

“I have no idea, let’s just grab them and go back before we get spotted,” Jonny agreed with his own put upon sigh, reaching down to snag the desired amount and an extra just in case and turning back towards the opposite end of the store where they were going to most likely find Jamie and Tyler.

“That is not the point, Jamie!” they heard Tyler shout as they rounded the corner to find an assortment of goods in the baskets they held in their arms. “We are Canadians!”

“Tyler, we are not buying maple syrup so we can pour it over crushed ice and eat it off of Popsicle sticks, none of us have done that since we were like six years old.”

“Exactly! Which is why we should be remembering the old! Nostalgia and all that don’t you remember the school carnaval’s and the stomach ache you had afterwards?”

“No,” Sid and Jonny said in unison as thy neared the pair and Tyler looked over and pouted at them as the three friends ganged up on the youngest man,

“You’re no fun,” Tyler muttered, grabbing a box of candy off of the shelf and dumping it in his basket.

“You do realize you are a professional athlete, right?” Jonny asked, eyeing Tyler’s basket with distaste. “There is not one thing in there that is natural; you shouldn’t be putting any of that shit in your body.”

“It is a Friday night and we are having a Team Canada party, bite me Toews,” Tyler said with a grin, pushing past the group and heading towards the registers. “Now let’s go get drunk!”

“Do you think he could have said that any louder?” Sid asked with a bigger sigh than before, making eye contact with both Jonny and Jamie as he said it.

“Yes, yes he could,” Jamie responded with a laugh and Sid and Jonny both sighed together as they started to head up the aisle after him.

“Here, give me the basket,” Sid said when he had reached Tyler. “You guys go sit in the car, if we are going to cause a scene it will be going through the register and most of the employees here are used to me by now so it won’t look weird.”

“Except for the fact that Sidney Crosby, holy child of Canada is buying junk food,” Jamie noted and Sid had to agree that it probably would look questionable. 

“Stop calling me holy child,” Sid muttered, grabbing the other basket from Jamie’s hands after passing Jonny the keys to his car. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

Luckily, the person on till was a young woman who looked to be about sixteen and didn’t even look up while scanning his order, popping her gum as Sid paid and grabbed the bags to leave, slipping out unnoticed and giving a huge sigh of relief, his shoulders sagging as he walked towards his car, noticing that the driver’s seat was luckily already empty.

Throwing the bags in the trunk, Sid jumped in the front as he noticed the song that had just started to play, looking at Tyler in the back with surprise.

“You listen to Bon Jovi?”

“No, but you do and you are being unreasonably cranky so maybe this will help you relax,” Tyler said with a shrug, leaning back to throw on his seatbelt now that everyone was in the car.

“I can’t say I am looking forward to getting so drunk I hurl,” Sid said petulantly, seeing Jonny raise his brows in agreement from the passenger seat. “But I also don’t have a choice if I want to make sure I don’t get a concussion, so here we are.”

“It’s not going to be that bad, you can’t tell us you’ve never been drunk before,” Jamie laughed in the back, leaning forward again so he was between Jonny and Sid as he had done on the ride there.

“Not drunk enough to hurl,” Sid muttered, thinking to himself that Tyler was right and he was actually in a pretty bad mood.

“Not even after your Stanley Cup’s?” Jonny asked in surprise and his cheeks coloured again though this time Sid had no idea why, sensing another story he might have to follow up on.

“Don’t get me wrong, I was pretty drunk, I just drank the same amount of water as I did alcohol and made sure to eat so it wasn’t that bad.”

“What kind of alcohol do you think they are going to buy?” Tyler questioned from the back, putting his phone away in his pocket. 

“Did you see who was in the other car? My team rival and a guy I took the Stanley Cup from last year. Whatever it’s going to be it’s going to burn and there’s nothing I can say about it,” Sid said pointedly, reaching out and twisting the volume knob so he could drown out his thoughts, listening to Bon Jovi instead of thinking how awful the rest of the evening was going to be.

The car had gone silent as everyone was off in their own thoughts and Sid blamed the fear of his coming doom for what happened next as he unconsciously started singing along to the lyrics of the song without meaning to as he tried to relax.

_“Tommy used to work on the docks, Union's been on strike, He's down on his luck...It's tough, so tough.”_

Tyler and Jamie both looked up at the same time, silently looking between Sid and Jonny who were staring out the window and apparently not realizing what they were doing as Jonny sang the next set of lyrics.

_“Gina works the diner all day, Working for her man, She brings home her pay, For love, for love”_

Sid looked over for half a second, seeing Jonny looking out the window and thinking that the other man also didn’t realize he had been singing, but since the other two were quiet in the back and Jonny was apparently not making fun of him, he figured it wouldn’t hurt to continue.

 _“She says, "We've gotta hold on to what we've got,”_ sang Sid.

 _“It doesn't make a difference if we make it or not,”_ sang Jonny.

 _“We've got each other and that's a lot, for love we'll give it a shot,”_ Jamie and Tyler shouted in the back and despite how hard he tried not to, Sid burst out into laughter, making eye contact with Jonny who was actually grinning pretty genuinely beside him and deciding to fuck it as the four of them shouted the lyrics to the chorus.

_“Whoa, we're half way there, Whoa, livin' on a prayer. Take my hand and we'll make it - I swear, Whoa, livin' on a prayer!”_

Sid turned into the driveway just as the song was finishing and he could feel how flushed his face had gotten. He knew he was a bad singer, but no one else had been the next Madonna either and for the first time that entire evening he had felt himself loosening up, enjoying seeing Jonny relaxing a bit too since he easily matched him for how serious each of them were.

“This gets repeated to no one,” Sid said seriously as he turned off the car, shooting a look specifically at Tyler but softening it with a smile a few seconds later, shaking his head and clambering out of the car just as the other vehicle pulled up behind them.

“Good timing, Crosby!” Burns shouted as he opened the trunk revealing a scary amount of boxes of beer, wine and mismatched drinks that Sid didn’t even want to look at and/or think about which is the reason he told himself he had went looking for Claude who was leaning casually against the car that he had driven over from Philly.

“How did it go?” Claude asked as Sid approached and Sid hated the fact that Claude was genuinely asking, hated the fact that this was something that happened now.

“Better than I expected. We didn’t get recognized by anyone and other than Tyler being a giant pain in the ass as usual it actually went fine. You guys?”

“Well, I had to convince Burns and Doughty that giving you straight moon shine was a really bad idea because we wanted you drunk not dead. I also had to talk them down from some of the stronger whiskeys and gins, but I think we settled on a few things that will do the trick. I thought about getting stuff you could mix, but it will work better if you just drink it straight, especially since we don’t have a ton of time so I had to step down a little,” Claude admitted and Sid was oddly touched by that.

“I still think I am going to die,” he said instead of admitting his thoughts out loud to Giroux, motioning for the pair to head back inside with some of the leftover bags, kicking the door closed behind them and walking directly into the backyard where everyone looked possibly more relaxed than before, though Sid also had time to notice that the cooler was essentially empty which explained a lot about that particular notion.

Sid answered a few questions from Weber and Getzlaf while passing around a few more beers to the guys who were empty, noticing a commotion on the deck as Tyler, Jamie, Claude, Jonny and a few others were organizing the snacks, Jonny’s voice getting more and more irate as they pulled stuff out of the bags though Sid had to admit that a lot of it had been pure junk and Jonny did have a point.

“So, looking forward to getting drunk?” Marchand asked as he sidled up to him, ignoring the look that Sid shot him and smiling in return. “It’s going to be fine, I’ve seen you drink before, at least you are not an obnoxious drunk.”

“I wasn’t even drunk at World’s,” Sid pointed out. “We went straight from Worlds to the pre-season; I didn’t want to not be ready because I was hungover.”

“Has anyone ever told you that you need to live a little while you’re young?” Brad asked with a gleam in his eye and that was mildly concerning considering what was about to go down. “We’ll teach you a few things about getting drunk and having fun.”

“Who is ‘we’?” Sid asked, but Brad was already walking away towards the deck where everyone else had seemed to convene and Sid reluctantly fell into step behind him.

“Grab a couple chairs,” Doughty said as everyone scrambled to make room, pushing Sid forward so he was sitting in the middle and staring ominously at the plate of sushi that  
was laid out before him.

“Okay, everyone who is supposed to be participating gather round,” Tyler instructed, watching as everyone moved so they were either sitting in the chairs beside Sid or standing behind them and watching. “So I was thinking about it in the car and we should probably record a video of us all eating one roll of sushi, because you can’t prove that anyone actually ate anything otherwise and that way Mario can’t say anything.”

“I thought the point was to not eat the sushi though,” Sid said pleadingly, catching the wry grin that Giroux sent his way and hating how weak he sounded trying to get out of this.

“He’s right Crosby, we all cheers our California roll, eat one and then for the rest of the night we pound alcohol into you. It’s a good plan, covers our asses,” said Doughty.

“But that still means I need to eat sushi,” Sid muttered, looking at the plate of sushi forlornly as he saw Tyler pull out his phone and turned it to video.

“Okay, everyone ready?” Tyler asked.

“I still think this is stupid,” Sid said one last time, praying he didn’t have to go through with this, though the resounding BLUE JERSEY that everyone yelled in his direction assuaged that pretty quickly and Sid sighed and looked up at the camera, noting how annoyed he looked and thinking it was probably for the best.

“Hey everyone, hope you are all having as good of a Friday night as we are,” Tyler started and everyone around them burst out laughing much to Tyler’s joy who pulled back the camera to show everyone from Team Canada waving at the camera. 

“A special shout out to all our Canadian friends, fans and families back home, hope you are all doing well and we are looking forward to seeing you tomorrow at the game. But we have an important matter that we need to take care of since our favourite captain, Sidney Crosby, lost a bet and it’s time he paid up!”

“I still don’t want to do this,” Sid said in reply and everyone around them started heckling him as Sid looked back down at the plate, all of his reactions being caught on camera.

“You see, Captain Crosby apparently hates sushi, but since he lost a bet at World’s on whether he or I was going to score first, he now has to pay up and eat up all at the same time!” Doughty crowed from his spot beside Sid and Sid had to admit it wasn’t a bad explanation actually as Doughty had indeed scored first and if the reaction of those around him was anything to go by, they all agreed.

“Alright boys,” Tyler shouted, reaching out and grabbing a California roll and waiting for the other players participating to do so as well. “Cheers!”

With that, Sid made a face, touching his sushi to that of the other players, scowling once more because he really didn’t want to do this, before throwing it back and grimacing as the taste hit his mouth.

“Oh my god,” Sid winced, coughing and choking on the taste as he tried to swallow around the roll in his mouth, the hooting and hollering making for what Sid imagined was going to be a perfect video for what they needed.

Out of the shot, Claude stepped forward and handed Sid a bottle of water which he took gratefully and chugged the entire thing back in one go, not caring whether the video was still rolling, just needing to get the taste of the sushi out of his mouth.

“You’re all the worst,” Sid said with a scowl when he noted that yes, the video was still running.

“Come on, Sid, only four more to go!” Tyler said happily and the group cheered as Sid’s face paled, just as Tyler winked at the camera and turned the video off, causing a second cheer to go up in the group around them.

“That was awful,” Sid said seriously, though everyone around them was laughing as a few people reached forward and started cleaning off the plate of sushi, the bags of chips and treats being ripped open and passed around as somewhere in the background music started to play loudly.

“Alright, time to drink up,” a voice said from the door and Sid turned to see Holtby and Price walking out with a few trays of shots. 

“Where on earth did you get that many shot glasses?” Sid found himself asking since he knew for a fact he didn’t own that many.

“That’s not important,” Holtby responded, placing the trays on the larger table as he and Carey started to set up 23 lines of three shots each in perfectly spaced increments around the table.

“What do we have?” Getzlaf asked, wandering over to help lay out the remaining shots and apparently clueing in on why there were six extra shots, adding two more shots to three of the 23 piles.

“Gin, whiskey and tequila for everyone and then a shot of Sambuca and vodka for our three lushes,” Holtby said more happily than Sid would have liked to hear, though the fact that they were all participating in the first place was enough to keep him quiet.

“Aren’t you not supposed to mix alcohol?” Sid asked, though the look the pair shot him told him they knew exactly what he was trying to do and wouldn’t be having any of it.

“Sid, it’s 11:54 at night, we need to get you drunk so you are actually throwing up by the time the game is supposed to start, you’re going to be mixing a hell of a lot more than this,” Holtby responded without feeling.

“Joy,” Sid remarked drily.

Without anyone having to say anything, everyone gathered around the table then, putting down their actual drinks if they had one and getting ready to drink just as Tyler walked out of the house with a large plate of limes, passing it around as everyone grabbed their allotted three, leaving a still sizeable amount for Sid, Segs and Tazer to grab.

Sid grabbed his five limes and organized them as he pleased for optimal lime sucking, moving them around absentmindedly before realizing that no one was speaking and looking up to see 22 grown men staring at him with bemused expressions on their faces.

“Oh, is this where I am supposed to give a speech?” Sid said lamely and everyone burst into laughter at his expense which Sid did not appreciate, especially when Tanger knocked into his side on his left.

“Look,” Sid began to say, stopping with a large sigh before resigning himself to having to thank everyone and carrying on. “Thank you for not laughing at me over this. I know it’s stupid and I know it doesn’t make sense, but it means more to me than I am willing to admit that you are willing to do this for me to keep me from getting another concussion. I know no one actually considers me the captain of the captains, but I am incredibly lucky to call you all part of my team so thank you.”

“And with that sappy comment, we drink!” Doughty shouted with a grin, interrupting Sid from having to continue as simultaneously 23 men grabbed their shots and downed them, one at a time in quick succession, stopping to suck on their limes and grimacing at the potency of each of the individual drinks that had been poured. Once the three shots had been taken for the majority, the men all started to cheer as Sid, Tyler and Jonny downed the Sambuca shot followed by the vodka shot that tasted exactly like how Sid imagined swallowing fire would be.

“Oh my god,” Sid gasped, just as Jonny and Tyler started sputtering beside him, each of the three clawing at their throats as they did so. “What the fuck is that?”

“Vodka,” Doughty provided helpfully as both Sid and Tyler fully bit into their limes, regretting it instantly when it did nothing to stop the burning that was cascading up and down their throats, grabbing the water that had helpfully landed on the table from out of nowhere and downing it in one go, Sid glaring at each of the men who had gone to buy the drinks. 

“That is not vodka,” Sid spat, massaging his throat and wincing.

“It’s not American vodka,” Burns supplied and just out of the corner of his eye Sid caught Giroux rolling his eyes and crossing his arms which led him to believe that _this_ was where Claude had lost out.

“G, what the fuck is this?” Sid directed towards Claude who looked like a deer caught in headlights for only a moment before managing to school his features. “That is disgusting.”

“Oh, you know,” Claude shrugged, uncrossing his arms so he could grab the back of his head and massage it slightly. “Just Russian vodka.”

“Where the fuck did you get Russian vodka?” Jonny said angrily, glaring daggers at Burns and Doughty who didn’t even have the decency to look guilty.

“The Capitals were still here,” Burns noted casually and Sid groaned loudly as soon as he clued in.

“Fucking Ovechkin,” he muttered under his breath, turning to look back behind him and thinking to himself that the world was spinning a bit faster than he thought it was supposed to. When he turned back, Holtby was reemerging from the house with more red solo cups than Sid had seen in a long time, motioning for everyone to clear the table so he could set up what appeared to be a beer pong game.

“There are only three of us though,” Jonny heard himself say as he watched Holtby setting up the cups on both ends of the table, Price coming behind him and filling them with an assortment of beer, whiskey, tequila and more Sambuca.

“Doughty and Burns will switch off every other drink,” Price stated simply and that was apparently that as Sid was positioned on one end of the table with Jonny while Tyler, Burns and Doughty took their positions on the other end, a crowd forming around the table though some people wandered off back to the campfire that had apparently been lit sometime while Sid and co. were at the store.

“Why are Jonny and I on the same team?” Sid asked disparagingly, having a sneaking suspicion that the teams were set up this way so he and Jonny would lose which was confirmed only seconds later.

“Because Captain Serious and Captain Canada belong together,” Burns said with a grin, picking up a ping pong ball that had materialized out of nowhere and plonking it directly into the glass to Sid’s right. And so it begins.

Maybe ten minutes later Sid had come to a rather unsurprising realization about himself around the fact that he was absolutely abysmal at beer pong if the amount of alcohol he had consumed recently was anything to go by. Groaning as Tyler landed yet another ball into a cup on their side, Sid looked wistfully at Jonny as he grabbed the traitorous red solo and downed the beverage, wincing as the Sambuca burned his throat.

“Hey Sid, how do you feel about sushi now?” Brad called from where he sat near the fire and something must have shown on Sid’s face as his stomach rolled as everyone started hooting and hollering. Turning to look at his partner, Sid noticed that he was looking about the same way that Sid felt and Sid couldn’t help but think that Tyler had been right about this plan and that was almost worse than anything else.

“Please get the next one in,” Sid said to Jonny after Tyler missed his next shot, who nodded morosely and sunk his next two shots, evening up the playing field and giving Sid a chance to sink the remaining cup which he did, naming them victors of the second round though neither Sid nor Jonny could particularly say they felt like a winner at this exact moment in time.

“Alright, one more round,” Tyler slurred, his eyes hazy with the effects of the alcohol. “Tie breaker.”

“Ugh,” Sid and Jonny groaned at the same time as Holtby and Price moved around the table refilling the glasses. “Aren’t you two supposed to be on our side?”

“Only when we are playing for Canada,” Price stated simply. “The other 98% of the time you two are dicks.”

“Only cause we score on you,” Jonny whispered to Sid, though he was clearly feeling the drinks if his “whisper-shout” was anything to go by. “Okay, losers have to do another vodka shot.”

“Jonny!” Sid flailed, slapping the other man’s arm and staring at him with a horrified expression on his face as he tried (and failed) to speak clearly. “We are awful at this, why would you suggest that?”

“Its fine, Sid,” Jonny said with a half-lidded smile. “We won’t feel it much longer anyways.”

As it turned out, Jonny was right and the three men at the other end of the table quickly picked up their game, knocking them out in under two minutes flat much to the amusement of themselves as they jumped up and down and embraced each other, Tyler looking small and out of place between the gruff looking men.

“Your shots, your highnesses,” Holtby said with a mock bow as he stepped forward to deliver their wager and Sid became painfully aware that he was plastered when one Holtby came forward and three stepped back.

“I’m going to die,” Sid repeated for the umpteenth time that night, grabbing the shot and downing it, keeping his eyes closed as the pain washed over his throat and down into his stomach and lungs, everything inside him burning, though at this point he couldn’t tell if it was good or bad.

As Sid opened his eyes the world began to spin and he stumbled as he took a step back, colliding into a body that was strong and warm and was helping to hold him up.

“Oomph,” Sid cried, grabbing onto the other body and pulling himself upright until he was making eye contact with Giroux who looked concerned, annoyed and flustered all at once.

“You’re orange,” Sid said matter-of-factly, poking Claude hard in the chest and giggling when the other man hissed at the contact.

“Don’t start this again, Crosby,” Claude scolded, grabbing Sid by the arm and helping him to a seat on the lawn that was currently unoccupied, dropping Sid down before taking the seat next to him and picking up his beer from the holder.

“Gimme,” Sid gestured, making grabby hands at the beer in Claude’s hands once he noticed it, though Claude simply pulled away so the beer was out of Sid’s reach.

“No, Sid, you’ve had enough for now,” Claude chided him, taking a big sip as he clearly needed it more than the drunken man who, fuck –

“Sid, get off my lap!” Claude shouted as beer spilled down his shirt and the entire backyard burst into laughter as they watched Sidney Crosby, prude and private man literally climb onto Claude so he could swipe the beer out of his hand, taking a long gulp until the beer was empty and collapsing onto the ground in front of Claude’s chair when he was done.

“Everything is spinning,” Sid provided helpfully, closing his eyes and leaning his head against Claude’s thigh, not remembering that he wasn’t supposed to do that in pubic and that he had been the one to stress that it had been a one-time thing all those months ago.

“Here, why don’t you drink this, it will help make the pain go away,” Claude suggested, having filled an empty beer bottle with water when he had noticed Sid move from drunk to inebriated and brought it over to his seat earlier for this very reason. 

“It doesn’t taste like anything,” Sid slurred after he had downed the bottle, Claude shaking his head as Sid wrapped his arms around his leg and latched on, looking around to see almost everyone watching them with amusement, while Tyler was in a similar position on Jamie’s lap and Jonny was –

“Goddamnit Jonny, don’t you dare jump in the water!” Claude shouted suddenly causing everyone to jump in surprise, Crawford quickly turning to grab Jonny as he launched himself at the water, just barely stopping his captain from crushing his skull against the side of the pool as most likely would have happened in his current state. When he finally managed to wrestle Jonny into the middle of the chairs that were in a loose circle around the fire and pushed him down, Jonny looked up with the same half-lidded smile as before as he addressed the crowd.

“I want…” Jonny started, seemingly having trouble getting his words to cooperate. “I want…I want….to…to play, pin….pin the beard…pin the beard.”

“What the fuck is pin the beard?” someone asked.

“Pin what on what beard is the better question,” someone else responded.

“I want…to pin the beard,” Jonny stated again, his eyes having completely closed now.

“Who’s beard,” Getzlaf asked and Jonny opened his eyes to stare at him with a focused expression as he tried to formulate a response.

“I want…to pin the cap…to the beard,” Jonny responded, reaching over and grabbing Burns’ beard and yanking it towards him, the man attached to the beard shouting and flailing  
as he fell to the ground in a heap of limbs, Jonny producing a bottle cap from out of nowhere and half-gently threading it into Burns’ beard, his entire being focused on this singular task.

“Motherfucker, you’re strong when you’re drunk,” Burns said with a half-laugh, half-groan, the alcohol coursing through his limbs having lessened the pain, though he did distantly realize that there was something being placed in his beard and that was going to be annoying to have to deal with later.

A second later, Burns felt as hands grabbed him, pulling him up and leading him so he was leaning against the deck, a beer being placed into his hands as something tight was pulled across his chest and Brent would have panicked at being tied to the deck if it wasn’t for the fact that he was warm and happy and pin the cap on the beard sounded like a really great idea right now.

“Alright, you’re up Tyler,” someone said from somewhere and Burns opened his eyes to see a staggering Tyler approaching, giggling as he neared, reaching forward and chucking a bottle cap the last few inches between them, crying out in protest as it missed and landed on the deck, behind him.

“No fair!” Tyler pouted and Jamie had to pull Tyler off to the side as Jonny came up to try and pin the cap on the beard once more, scratching his cheek slightly as he hooked the cap in his hands into the strands around Brent’s left cheek.

“You’re like a Christmas tree for bottle caps,” Jonny said in complete seriousness and Burns had to agree at that, nodding amiably as Tyler stumbled forward and placed a cap into his board with much more finesse than the first time, whooping loudly as he completed his task, Marchand pushing him out of the way so he could pin the cap on the beard, though he was decidedly less drunk and much more gentle than either the first two had been.

This carried on for what felt like ages as most people at the party took their turns, but really only lasted a total of four minutes. When Getzlaf finally let Burns go, it was with a beard full of caps and a belly full of beer and Burns was content to go lie beside the fire and make angels in the grass as he listened to the murmur of the voices around him.

“This is amazing,” Tavares said quietly, looking over at Tanger who had stripped his shirt off at some point during the night and was lounging against the fence with a beer in his hand. 

Oui, mon amie,” Tanger agreed, eyeing Tyler from across the fire, who was petting Jamie’s hair, carefully styling it into different looks as Jamie sat casually, engrossed in a conversation with Weber who was sitting beside him, seemingly not bothered in the slightest that a grown man was sitting in his lap and playing with his hair. Jonny was also sitting nearby, staring with extreme focus at the board of checkers that was splayed out in front of him, he and Doughty engaged in an intense battle of 1 am checkers though Kris was relatively positive that Sid didn’t actually own a game of checkers and therefore had no idea where the board had come from.

What had caught Kris’ attention out of everything, however, was the aforementioned man himself, who was leaning against Claude Giroux’s legs and looking up at him as if he were the only man in the world, while Claude himself seemed resigned to the fact that Sid was choosing to octopus around his lower body and seeming less uncomfortable than one would expect.

“Do you think something happened between them at World’s?” Tavares asked and Tanger looked over to catch his gaze which was where his had just been. 

“Had to have,” Tanger said simply. “Sid called him a great player earlier and last time we played the Flyers he had a great opportunity to crush Giroux against the boards and he never took it. That was a red flag in itself.”

“Is it so bad? If they both hate each other less, I mean?”

“It is if you consider how they came to hate each other less and the fact they both have girlfriends,” Tanger replied, looking over at Price who made a soft choking noise in the back of his throat at Kris’ words.

“I didn’t know that,” Carey said after a moment of both Tanger and Tavares looking at him. “But they definitely hooked up at World’s, I was the one unfortunate to be in the room attached to Sid’s and I assure you that Weber was not the one sleeping there as assigned.”

“How the fuck did that happen?” Tavaras hissed and Tanger thought it amusing that he was the one getting upset and not himself since his best friend had apparently decided to bone the enemy without telling anyone, specifically him.

“Not a fucking clue, mon amie, not a fucking clue.”

If Tanger was honest with himself, he was livid at the idea that Sid had for some reason decided to shack up with the enemy. But on the other hand, Kris had also seen something change in Sid during World’s that appeared to be a continuation from the IIHF championships the year before and Kris was glad in a weird way that Vlasic had gotten hurt, allowing him to join Team Canada and witness it first hand to help lessen the impact he was feeling now watching the pair on the other side of the fire.

“Can you tell the world to stop spinning so fast?” Sid asked from where he had his head buried in Claude’s lap much to the other man’s resignation.

“I’ll get right on that,” Claude replied.

“Do you hate me?” Sid asked after a moment of silence and Claude sighed and looked to the heavens before he answered.

“Not as much as I used to,” he eventually said honestly.

“I don’t hate you as much either,” Sid said carefully, though he still managed to slur his words.

“I know,” Claude huffed. “You told me this last time you got drunk and decided to be an octopus.

“Do you still hate me because I broke your wrists?”

“I’m always going to hate you for breaking my wrists,” Claude said quietly, running a hand through Sid’s hair and passing him another “water beer.”

“I’m sorry,” Sid whispered into Claude’s thigh after he drank it and Claude shook his head at the conversation.

“I know, you told me last time.”

“You can’t hate me that much if you had sex with me though, even if we were both drunk,” Sid said in a hushed tone and Claude found himself thankful that the drunken man was able to at least do that much, unlike Tazer who had been waxing poetic about Patrick Kane for at least the last fifteen minutes in the loudest voice known to humankind.  
“I know which is what I told you last time you asked.”

“We had sex when we were sober too,” Sid added as an afterthought.

“I know, Sid, I was there for that too,” Claude sighed.

“We both have girlfriends,” Sid whispered and Claude’s stomach clenched at the thought as yes they did and yes they still had.

“I know that too,” Claude whispered back, continuing running his hand through the other man’s hair before he said what he had been meaning to say for a long time. “I don’t regret it though.”

“Me either,” Sid admitted, turning his head and kissing Claude’s thigh gently, Claude himself looking around to see that no one noticed before turning back to the conversation and hating that the only way he got to see Sid this way was when he was drunk out of his mind as that was the only time he ever truly even liked Claude and it killed him.

“I don’t like you in red,” Sid said out of nowhere, pulling Claude from his thoughts who looked down at the man in his lap with a questioning gaze before realizing that he wasn’t looking at him.

“Should I be offended?” Claude asked with a cautious tone.

“No, you look go in red, but you look great in orange,” Sid mumbled. “Your hair is all orange and your jersey is orange and down there is orange and it makes me want to call you pumpkin when no one is looking.”

“I know….you told me little bird,” Claude said in a whisper after the feeling around his heart had finally dissipated, adding in the name he had given Sid that fateful night all those months ago. “You told me.”

“What if they don’t believe me,” Sid finally said after a much longer stretch of silence had passed and Claude didn’t have to ask to know what Sid was referring to. “What if they make me play and I get hurt? I don’t have anything if I don’t have hockey.”

“Don’t think like that, little bird,” Claude said in a soothing voice, running his hand over Sid’s hair and down his neck, repeating the motion several times before he continued. “You’ve done everything you can to get out of playing and while I hate the idea that you had to get plastered to do it, I understand and we all understand why you had to. It will be okay.”

“Do you think I am a coward?” Sid asked and that of all questions had Claude pausing before he answered.

“I don’t like it,” Claude started slowly, stopping his hand’s motions. “But I can’t stop thinking that if I were you I’d probably do the same thing. It’s okay to be scared some times.”

A loud hoot had Claude looking up just in time to catch Jonny flipping the checkers board at Doughty who had obviously just won another round, effectively breaking the bubble that had formed around Claude and Sid and blocked the rest of the world out. Looking around the group, Claude could see the clear signs of exhaustion present on everyone’s face and decided that now was as good a time as any to wrap things up.

“Alright boys,” Claude said with a whistle to catch everyone’s attention. “Let’s get things one, two and three up to bed and tidy up so hungover Sid doesn’t have to deal with it in the morning.”

“You don’t even like Sid,” Getzlaf said with a laugh, though he was standing up and moving his chair to the shed all the same.

“He doesn’t seem to care about that right now,” Claude called back, though he doubted whether anyone would actually believe him if the current display of affection said anything.

Patting Sid on the back, Claude motioned Stamkos over who had been sitting relatively close by and the pair hoisted Sid up, each of the men throwing one of Sid’s arms over their  
shoulder and moving inside, toeing off their shoes like the good Canadian boys that they were as they headed further into the house.

Once they had gotten Sid upstairs, Claude told Stamkos he was good as he dropped Sid onto his bed, reaching down and making to undo Sid’s belt after Stamkos had left, finally managing to get his pants and socks off with absolutely no help from the drunken man himself who Claude was also relatively positively was fast asleep. Finishing stripping him of everything other than his boxers, Claude grabbed a blanket off of a chair nearby and threw it over Sid’s body, sitting on the edge of the bed briefly so he could set the alarm for the morning and looking over his shoulder when a soft snore escaped the other man’s lips.

“Goodnight little bird,” Claude whispered in French, tucking in the blanket before heading out of the room, running downstairs to get three glasses of water and the last pieces of their plan, heading back upstairs and dropping everything off, Weber following behind him with garbage cans that they placed beside each of the bed’s, Jamie shaking his head at them as Claude placed the final piece beside the water on the nightstand as Jamie climbed under the covers with Tyler, having apparently decided to stay the night.

Once Claude was back downstairs, he headed into the backyard to find everyone already having cleaned up everything, the only thing left being to take the trash to the dumpster out back which Claude, Tavares and Getzlaf did without complaint, closing the gate behind them when they were done and taking one last look around to make sure they hadn’t missed anything.

“Hey, when did you snap that Team Canada photo?” Tavares asked as they were walking back outside, sliding the door shut behind them.

“Just worked out,” Claude said ruefully in reference to the photo he had managed to take of all of Team Canada sitting around the fire and Tweeted out, his seat far enough back that he was able to fit them all in. “Seemed like it would go along well with our plan.”

“I liked it,” Tavares said, seemingly about to say something else before stopping himself and turning towards the front door, pulling on his shoes as Claude and Getzlaf followed, exiting the house with only a little bit of regret since they knew Jamie was staying behind and would be able to take care of things in the morning and hopefully get them to the rink on time. Tanger was also staying behind and he nodded carefully at Claude before closing the door, the distinctive sound of the lock barely able to be heard over the noise of everyone outside and Claude beeped his car to give access to everyone who was waiting to get in as they started to split up and head back to their hotels.

“That was fun boys,” Doughty said with a booming laugh just before he got in and everyone nodded their agreement. “Let’s do it again in the summer some time when we can all get drunk and don’t have to worry about putting on a front in the morning.”

“Sounds good to me,” Claude added to the mix of agreement that was going around in the group, patting Weber on the back and shaking hands with Getzlaf as he walked towards his car. “Night gentlemen.”

“Well that was fun,” Burns said drunkenly once they had gotten out of Sid’s gated community and were heading back towards central Pittsburgh where they were all staying in close proximity.

“You say that now,” Claude replied skeptically, eyeing the clock that read 2:37 in the morning and then meeting Burns’ eyes in the mirror. “But we still need to see how tomorrow goes.”

Tomorrow, or rather later that day, started with a loud knocking noise on Sid’s bedroom door that reverberated right through his body and into the depths of Sid’s brain, causing him to groan audibly as he started to wake up and recall what had happened the night before.

Raising his head slowly just as Tanger stepped into the room, Sid made eye contact with the plate of sushi that was sitting on his nightstand and promptly rolled over and hurled off the edge of the bed into the garbage can that was conveniently placed, only getting a few chunks on the carpet which he would worry about later.

“Well, if the fact that you Segs and Tazer all lost your lunch when you saw the sushi,” Kris said drily after Sid had finally stopped, “then everything is going to go perfectly to plan.”

“I hate you,” Sid groaned into the pillow, raising his head and sniffing before rolling over and throwing up once more, reaching blindly for the water and knocking the plate of sushi off into the can of vomit.

“Delightful,” Kris said with a disgusted expression, leaving the room immediately now that he knew Sid was awake, meeting Jamie back in the kitchen where the two drank their coffees and waited for the three men to make it downstairs.

Sid eventually managed to stop throwing up, ensuring to scrub his teeth more than once before and after he showered and grateful that Stamkos had suggested putting out toothbrushes for the other two guests before they started to drink so that he wouldn’t forget. 

Finally getting dressed, Sid shivered and wrapped the sweater tighter around himself, meeting Tyler on the stairs who looked sweaty and disheveled, neither of the two saying a word as they walked into the kitchen to find Jonny with his head against the island and a bowl between his legs as he unsuccessfully tried to stop himself from hurling.

“Hello sunshine’s,” Tanger said with a grin and Sid shot him a look that he hoped would kill. “We should probably get going if we don’t want to be late.”

“I hate you,” Sid repeated, though he directed it at both of the sober men this time as he grabbed another bottle of water from the fridge, passing one to Tyler who stood uneasily  
near the bathroom door which was thankfully ajar.

“Come on, it’s just a bad bit of sushi,” Jamie said with a laugh, and Tyler and Sid barely made it to the kitchen sink and bathroom toilet before they were violently losing their lunches once again.

“I think I am going to enjoy this,” Jamie said with a laugh, wincing only slightly when Sid and Jonny both shot him matching glares, though the laugh from Tanger had him feeling marginally safer as they quickly made everyone clean up their vomit and headed out of the house, packing the three sickos into the car and only having to stop twice on the way to the rink so that one or two of the men in the back could hurl outside of the car’s interior.

Once they arrived at the rink, Jamie and Tanger escorted everyone inside, Team Canada having its own separate room for this event, though Kris and Jamie made sure to pull Tyler and Jonny into the Pittsburgh dressing room where they were met with 21 confused expressions.

“What’s going on?” Kunitz asked and Tanger shook his head as Sid decided to grab the wall near the bathroom and sink to the ground, Jonny and Tyler dropping down beside him as the three closed their eyes and whimpered.

“What happened to them?” Kunitz repeated, his eyes wide with concern as he looked at the three grown men who were wrapped in warm sweaters, pale and sweating profusely, eyeing them uneasily when Kris handed each of them a garbage can from around the room.

“Sushi,” Jamie said just as the coaching staff and Mario walked into the room, Sid, Jonny and Tyler promptly throwing up at exactly the same time.

“What the fuck is going on here?” Mario shouted, stepping forward in concern and immediately stepping back when Tyler threw up again, his nose scrunching up when he caught a whiff of the smell.

“Stupid bet,” Tyler groaned, dry heaving as soon as he spoke.

“Your fucking idea,” Jonny muttered, his eyes squeezed tightly shut.

“How was I supposed to know it was bad?” Tyler cried just as Jonny gave in and threw up again into the can, the rest of the room looking horrified and moving increasingly farther away from the three men. "I'm never having sushi again."

“Benn, explain to me what the fuck is going on,” Mario said crossly and Jamie gulped audibly before he started to speak.

“You see sir, we had a Team Canada get together last night and the guys reminded Sid of a bet he lost at World’s that meant he had to try a plate of sushi. There’s a video on Ty’s Twitter if you want to watch it,” Jamie said as calmly as he could manage, though Mario was staring intensely at him and Jamie was frankly terrified. “But when we woke up this morning, everyone who had any of the sushi was throwing up.”

At the mention of the word sushi, Sid heaved into the can, his throat dry and scratchy as he coughed, dropping his head onto his shoulder and praying to some God that this plan was going to work because he truly felt like he was dying and had no plans to get off of this floor for the rest of the day.”

“Who else had the sushi?” Mario asked after only a slight pause, eyeing the three with distaste as the room started to smell like vomit.

“Doughty, Burns, Holtby and Tavares had some sir. I think maybe a couple of others, but these three ate the most which explains why they are the most sick,” Jamie responded, just as Doughty and Burns were shuffled in by the Pens medical staff, both looking green as they waited to be addressed.

“Did you have the sushi too?” Mario asked and both men pushed past him purposefully, stepping into the bathroom where the distinctive noise of even more men throwing up could be heard.

“Where the fuck did you get this sushi?” Mario asked generally and Sid groaned before speaking.

“Stop saying that word,” Sid begged, gagging on the bile in his throat. “Water, please get us some water. And it was from the supermarket, the one by our house.”

“Sid!” Mario cried, throwing his hands up in the air. “That supermarket had an Ebola breakout like a month ago, what did I tell you about going there?”

“I’m sorry,” Sid muttered, placing his can beside him and leaning into Jonny, Tyler doing the same on the other side of him as the three slumped together in miserable defeat.

“This is amazing,” Jamie whispered into Kris’ ear and Kris had to cover up his laugh with a cough as he had to agree, watching Mario repeatedly pull at his hair in frustration.

“What are we supposed to do when one of our best players and several other reputable NHL players are all throwing up on our locker room floor? We can’t exactly have Sid play like this; he’d be throwing up all over the ice!” Mario shouted after another few moment’s had passed.

“Well he can’t play, that’s for sure,” Sully said with a grimace, wrinkling his nose at the smell. “We will have to let PR know so they can tweet it out. Alright boys, we’ve already gone over the game plan yesterday so let’s get out of this room and leave these boys be. Let’s stick to our game, play fast, play ferocious and have fun out there. It’s not every day that you get to play outside, so work together, keep your head low away from the sun and let’s score some goals.”

Kris was changed by now as the rest of the team filed out of the room, patting Jamie on the back as he pulled his blue jersey over his head, looking down at Sid who had opened one eye and was watching him wearily.

“Feeling blue, mon amie?” Kris asked with a grin, Sid gagging on the thought as Tanger started to walk out of the room after the rest of the team to get ready for warmups, Jamie’s laugh following him all the way.

“Let’s get one thing clear,” a voice said from the darkness outside the locker room and Kris only barely managed to stop himself from jumping as Mario stepped forward. “This was all an elaborate plan to get Sid out of playing today’s game wasn’t it?”

“I have no idea what you are talking about,” Kris replied easily, hoping his demeanour was as confident as he hoped it was.

“I don’t know why, I don’t know how Sid managed to convince grown men to eat bad food so they could get food poisoning, but I want you to know that I know and if it ever gets out into the public I will hunt you down and make you all regret the day you decided to mess with me,” Mario said fiercely and though Kris loved and respected the guy, he had to admit he was a little bat shit crazy at times.

“Will you make him do bag skates?” Kris asked in his heavily accented English, pretending to go along with Mario’s theory which he figured was the better of the two options.

“No, Kris, I don’t think I will,” Mario said after a moment, clapping a hand on his shoulder. “I think they are suffering enough, don’t you?”

“Yes, sir,” Kris agreed, too scared to break eye contact as Mario continued to stare him down.

“You on the other hand, I will see bright and early Monday morning.”

“Yes, sir,” Kris said dejectedly, with only a hint of anger in his tone. Fucking Sid always causing him more pain than he needed. “I will see you then, sir.”

“Yes you will, Kris. One more thing,” Mario added just as Kris had started to walk away. 

“Yes?” Kris asked, ensuring not to make eye contact as he turned around so he could get away easier when he was done. 

“Make sure his locker is full of sushi before he gets there,” Mario said with a wry grin and that? Well that was something Kris could get behind.

***

_@Sportsnet: BREAKING: Sidney Crosby and several Team Canada members to miss today’s festivities due to food poisoning. More to come._

***

_@NHL: FINAL: PHI 4 – PIT 3 (OT)  
GWG Scored by C Claude Giroux_

***

 **Sid 3:56 PM**  
Bastard.

 **Claude 4:17 PM**  
How’s that sushi feeling now?

 **Sid 4:19 PM**  
I hate you, you know that?

 **Claude 5:03 PM**  
I know. You told me.

 **Sid 5:11 PM**  
Shut up. See you next time, pumpkin.

 **Claude 5:14 PM**  
See you next time, little bird.

**Author's Note:**

> I actually have no idea where this came from except for the fact that I read an article that said Sid hated the blue jerseys and almost 15,000 words later here we are. This fic in an unintended monster.
> 
> Sidney & Claude as a thing was not intended - that relationship wrote itself. This is unbeta'd. All mistakes are my own. Kudos and comments are welcome. Tell me what you liked, didn't like or what else you want to see.
> 
> Come hang out at hobrerek.tumblr.com x All the love!


End file.
